In this path-breaking work of intellectual and cultural history, Glass argues that the answers lie in the rise of a particular ethos of public health and sanitation that emerged from the German medical establishment and filtered down to the common people. Building his argument on a trove of documentary evidence, including the records of the German medical community and of other professional groups, he traces the development in the years following WWI of theories of racial hygiene that singled out the Jews as an infectious disease, and that determined them as ''life unworthy of life'' in the works of Nazi propagandists and German scientists.

In this path-breaking work of intellectual and cultural history, Glass argues that the answers lie in the rise of a particular ethos of public health and sanitation that emerged from the German medical establishment and filtered down to the common people. Building his argument on a trove of documentary evidence, including the records of the German medical community and of other professional groups, he traces the development in the years following WWI of theories of racial hygiene that singled out the Jews as an infectious disease, and that determined them as ''life unworthy of life'' in the works of Nazi propagandists and German scientists.